Blog 11 - Lesson 1 Reflection

1. What are you most proud of in your lesson, and why?

I am proud of the fact that I was able to make it through my lesson and pass the time. I was also proud of how much research I actually put into that small amount of time that we had.

2. What assessment would you give yourself on your lesson? Explain why you earned that grade using evidence from the component contract.

I would of probably given myself an AP honestly. I won't even lie. I could not move from behind the podium because I was terrified and without my script my mind would of went blank even if I did memorize everything. 

3. If you could go back, what would you change about your lesson? How can you use that knowledge to give a better Lesson 2?

I would most likely be more comfortably now that I know what to expect and I would have said all off the top of my head. I think I could have done a better hook activity, but next time I will. 

Blog 10 - Interview 2 Reflection

1. Please explain how you are spending your mentorship time (Is it at a workplace or somewhere else? Are you shadowing? Are you able to do tasks that are meaningfully related to the topic? If so, what? Are there other people who are experts in the location? Etc...)

My mentorship time is spent working in the optometrist's office. I get to observe how the doctor and his opticians work with the patients, and there are a variety of them. I also get to learn about the financial aspect of optometry. 

2. How did you find your mentor? How did you convince this person to help you? 

I found this mentor through my Aunt who has been this doctor's optician for 13 years. I know the doctor fairly well and he agreed to help me out.



3. How would you rate your comfort level with your mentor at this point in your relationship? How does this relate to the time you've spent so far at mentorship/with this person

 My comfort level with Dr. Spaulding is about 7/10. We will hopefully grow closer as I begin to work with him more. Recently I haven't been able to talk to him as much as I'd like because he has been busy with patients. 

4. What went well in this interview? Why do you think so? What do you still need to improve? How do you know? How will you go about it?

I believe I learned quite a bit from Dr. Spaulding regarding his background and how he started. I think it went well because I allowed him to speak and the interview was not rushed in anyway. What I still need to improve regards my interview questions and I know for a fact that I need to dig deeper. Doing this will require me asking more in-depth questions. 

Blog 9 - Advisory Prep 3

1. State whether or not you currently have a mentor, and what the status of your interview is with that person (I have completed the interview, I have scheduled the interview, I have not scheduled the interview, etc).

My mentor is Dr. Donald H. Spaulding, O.D and I have an interview scheduled for this weekend. 

2. At this point, your research is probably guiding your studies toward more specific areas within 

your topic. Name the area or two you find most promising and explain your reasons. 

When doing my research I came upon two specific areas of optometry that I would be interested in studying further: Doctor-Patient Relationships and Optometry/Psychology Collaboration. They are both unique and interesting to me, I just need to figure out how to get myself further involved in the two of them.

3. What kinds of sources do you think will help you in the next month to gain more research depth? Where will you go to get them?

I think I will use my mentor as a source. Most of my sources will most likely come from online research and perhaps a couple of books. These will help me go in depth regarding the Psychology/Optometry collaboration.

4. Write down a possible EQ. Please don't worry about wording other than ensuring that it provides the option for multiple correct answers. At this point, the senior team is most interested in understanding your thought process.

What is the best way to reduce patient non-compliance? 

Blog 8 - Independent Component 1 Proposal

Independent Component 1

1. Describe in detail what you plan to do for your 30 hours.

I actually plan to work extra hours for Dr. Spaulding at his office in Upland. I'll get to have more conversations with him and get to know him better. I'll also get to do more stuff around the office rather than observe, such as being taught more stuff about how to work with patients and perhaps even working with them face-to-face.

2. Discuss how or what you will do to meet the expectation of showing 30 hours of evidence.

I will work 30 extra hours of service and photograph my time there for evidence. I will also have the doctor sign off on the hours that I did.

3. Explain how what you will be doing will help you explore your topic in more depth.

Being in the office more will allow me to get a better perspective on how the doctor and his opticians work with the patients and make them comfortable. 

4. Update your Senior Project Hours log.

Senior Project Hours are Logged. 

Blog 7 - Second Interview Preparation

1.  Who is your mentor and where do they work?  If their workplace does not reflect their expertise, what makes them an expert?

My mentor is Donald H. Spaulding.He graduated from the Southern California College of Optometry in 1979 and since 1980, he has been practicing Optometry in the city of Upland. 

2.  What five questions will you ask them about their background?

1.  Why did you choose to become an Optometrist, what inspired you?
2. When did you open your office? What was it like at first?
3. What is your favorite part about being an optometrist?
4. Do you have any special techniques for working with a patient? 
5. What are some tips you can give me when working with a patient?
6. Do you have any people you would recommend I talk to for future references?

Blog 6 - Advisory Prep

1. What has worked well for you concerning senior project this year? What has made it a positive experience for you? 

Well, what has worked well for me is the fact that my Aunt is an optician and has connections to many people in the field of optometry and ophthalmology. It's easier to connect with other professional through a professional you've known for years. So it makes it a lot easier because you know and trust they are guiding you in the right direction.



2. What are you finding difficult concerning senior project? How can you adapt to make that portion work better for you? How might the senior team help?

I'm not finding many things difficult currently in this Senior Project, but I am sure that in the future there will be difficult things ahead. The senior team cannot help me in any way and I am perfectly fine with that. If there are difficult things that I may have to face, I can adapt to them by just focusing on one thing at a time while also being efficient at it. 

Blog 5 - Interview 1 Reflection

1. What is the most important thing I learned from the interview? Is there anything I would do differently for other interviews?

The most important thing that I learned from this interview is that there is more to the optometry field than I thought there was. It is a much more complex field and requires a lot of patience. For other interviews, I believe that I would allow the interviewee to review the questions before doing the interview. That way they are much more prepared.

 2. Did I get additional resources and contacts? What is the most useful? Why?

I was quite surprised when I was able to get an ophthalmologist as a recommendation, I actually had no idea that my aunt was actually friends with one. It will make things a lot more interesting since I now have all levels of the eye medical field. My mentor, an optometrist, and other doctors in this field will help me quite a bit when it comes to studying the patient and doctor relationship.


3. What makes my interviewee qualified to help me?

My interviewee has been an optician for 27 years and has worked with her employer, my mentor,  as his optician for 13 and a half years now. She has worked with quite a bit of patients and has a lot of advice to offer me.

Interview 1

Blog 4 - House Advisory Prep

The things I hope to accomplish through my senior project topic are:

1. Acquiring the knowledge needed to work in an environment such as a doctor's office. 
2. The knowledge needed to work with patients even at the most inconvenient moments. 
3. I hope to learn many things about optometry, as it is actually something that I am quite interested in.

That's pretty much it for now, but I am sure there will definitely be many more things that I hope to accomplish as the year goes on, but as of this moment, I am focusing more on the Patient-Doctor relationship aspect of optometry because trust is one of the most vital parts of any given job, especially when it comes to medical practices.  

Blog 3 - First Interview Preparation

1) Who do you plan to interview? Why?
For my first interview, I plan to interview my Aunt who is an Optometrist Assistant. Optometrist Assistants are similar to Opticians and assist with fixing frames and ordering prescription lenses and contacts. She's been working with my mentor for quite a while. She would help me get familiar with some of the patient connections side of the field.

2) What are some questions you would ask besides the five required ones?
Some questions I would ask are:

• From your perspective, what do you like most about working with your current optometrist?
• Tell me about your relationship with the doctor.
• Tell me about some of the things you need to remember when working with the patients.

Making a Change

So it looks like I will be making a change soon into a different topic hopefully. I recently called my Aunt who works at an Optometrist's office. This is just to notify anyone reading this as this blog will make big twist and I will have to re-do the blogs.

Blog 2 - Summer Mentorship

1. List the contact name, phone number, and organization of the person with whom you volunteered.

Miguel Hernandez
(626) 407-7416
Miguel's Plumbing


2. What qualified this person as an expert in your topic choice?


This person who I mentored under was indeed an expert in the business of Plumbing. We spent many long hours throughout many weeks working with his clientele all over Southern California.


3. List three questions for further exploration now that you've completed your summer hours.

How much time did you spend working under your mentor?

I honestly didn't even know that I was working that many hours, I only mentioned the major jobs in the hours log because they were the longest but overall, I worked at least 27 in two weeks during June and 35 during two weeks in July and I'm going to continue to work with my Uncle throughout the year, because this job allows you to really connect with people.

Is this a difficult topic to do?

Yes and No. Yes, because it is harder to pin-point what things to really explain in a presentation since this isn't a usual thing a person would present about, but people really don't understand how much work goes into pipelines, sinks, etc. and no, because many of these jobs are simple which is why I only log the major ones which require long hours of driving and extreme patience.

Are you interested in pursuing this as a career?

While it is an interesting, and I'll be honest, fun job to work, I would not choose this as my career. I don't think I have the stomach to be able to do this dirty work all the time, but I got to hand it to plumbers, their job might look easy, but it is more difficult then you might perceive it to be. It takes a lot of patience and knowledge about piping to know how to get it right the first time.


4. What is the most important thing you gained from this experience? Why?


The most important thing I've gained from this experience is to always take a risk when there are no major consequences. My Uncle started out mentoring under another one of my Uncles because he didn't have a job at the time and soon he was out on his own trying to build up his own plumbing business. He began making connections with his clients and his clients would recommend him to other clients and soon enough, his business was set and ready to go. He used his money to buy more tools for the trade and now he's good to go.


5. What is your senior project topic going to be? How did mentorship help you make your decision? Please explain.


My Senior Project Topic is going to be, "What makes or breaks a successful Plumbing Business?" It may not sound interesting but once you really get into it, it can be very intriguing. My mentorship helped me make this decision because its an unexpected job someone would choose, you never really think about how your water gets to you or how your sink remains functioning. When you pay a plumber to fix stuff in your house, you probably don't realize what they are doing, but hopefully I will be able to explain it all throughout the year.

My Mentorship Hours Log

Blog 1 – Senior Final Lesson/Interview Reflection

1. What three lessons were most helpful for you to see, and why?

The three lessons that I deemed most important to myself were:

• Security, because it taught me that I need to be very aware of my surroundings and how to protect myself properly by teaching me how to not lose my cool, how to not fight unless needed to, and how to properly handle a situation to keep the peace. 
• Astrophysics because just how awesome it was to learn all of that stuff about and our presenter was amazing in delivering that information to us in such a way that it was fun and easy to understand. She was confident and outstanding and that's how I want my presentation to go.
• Film Production by, I believe, Micah Chambers was also one of the best presentations I went to, but not just because it was film, but also because she captivated me. She is an excellent and articulate speaker and knows how to present well. By her presentation  I was quite bored but she definitely kept my attention at all times. 

      2.  List one thing that you learned about the senior project in interviews that will help you get off to a good start?

• I didn't get to be interviewed but if I was, a lesson I would have liked to learn was how to get over the anxiety that I currently have with presenting. That would've been the most essential thing to me. 

      3.  What topic(s) are you considering, and why?

• I was considering film during the middle of Junior year, but Junior year killed me being involved in film at school and so many people want to go into that field, but I simply don't want to make my beloved hobby a job. It will kill it for me at home, just like it did at school, but who knows maybe I'll give it another try.
• Another topic that I think would be interesting is Plumbing, I have an Uncle who owns his own company that would make the perfect mentor, but it would be more difficult to create an essential question for that. 

      4.  What EQ do you think might be interesting to consider in guiding a project like this? (Please don't worry about any sort of formula...we want this question to come from your genuine interest).

• For film, my essential question was going to go around the lines of this, "How can a filmmaker properly engage his audience using the manipulation of emotion in a film or product and succeed?"
• For Plumbing my essential question would have to be, "What makes or breaks a successful plumber and plumbing business?"

      5.  What are some ideas you have about finding summer mentorship?

1. Go out to Los Angeles and find a institution that has a film class within and find a mentor there, which probably won't happen or find someone who has connections to the film industries. 
2. Ask my Uncle if he could mentor me in Plumbing. 

       These are my plans for the Summer of 2015.